Pro-Israel lobby influencing US policy, academics say

Two leading academics claim that Middle East policy in the United States has become unbalanced because of the activities of a right-wing pro-Israel lobby.

Transcript

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TONY JONES: The latest conflict between Israel and its neighbours has again highlighted the critical role played by the United States in the Middle East. But two leading American academics have sparked a war of words over their claim that US-Middle East policy has become unbalanced because of the activities of a right-wing pro-Israeli lobby, which tries to shut down critics by labelling them anti-Semitic. Well, a similar controversy is brewing in Australia with the only current Jewish federal parliamentarian, Michael Danby, calling on Melbourne University Press not to publish a book, which criticises Israel's policies towards Palestinians, and which accuses the pro-Israel lobby in Australia of bullying tactics. In a moment, we'll hear the book's author debate a senior member of Australia's leading Jewish lobby group. But first, Margot O'Neill talks to some of the key players in the United States over the controversy there over the power of the Israeli lobby.

MARGOT O'NEILL: Since the Six Day War in 1967, the key to American foreign policy in the Middle East has been Washington's relationship with Israel. The problem is that there's no longer any compelling moral or strategic reasons for such a policy, or so argues John Mearsheimer - a West Point graduate, former air force officer and now a senior professor of politics at the University of Chicago. But his argument is considered so controversial that when he and Professor Stephen Walt - the academic dean of the Kennedy School of Politics at Harvard University - tried to publish a critique of the Israel lobby in the United States, they were forced to go to England instead.

PROFESSOR JOHN MEARSHEIMER, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO: We couldn't get the piece published, it, therefore, had to be published outside of the United States.

MARGOT O'NEILL: The article, entitled The Israel Lobby, first appeared in March this year, in the London Review of Books. Professor Mearsheimer says he wasn't surprised that he and Stephen Walt were almost immediately attacked by leading American lawyer Alan Dershowitz as being anti-Semitic.

PROFESSOR JOHN MEARSHEIMER: Well, we referred to charge of anti-Semitism in the piece as the 'great silencer'. What happens is that when individuals criticise Israel or organisations criticise Israeli policy, what almost axiomatically happens is those individuals are called anti-Semitic or if they're Jewish, they're labelled 'self-hating Jews'.

MARGOT O'NEILL: The article argues that because of the Israel lobby, US-Middle East policy is unbalanced and has undermined American and Western security.

PROFESSOR JOHN MEARSHEIMER: Well, the fact is, in the American political system, it's very easy for well-organised interest groups to penetrate the American political process and to influence particular policies. This is true if you look at an organisation like the National Rifle Association. Most Americans are in favour of gun control but the NRA, which is a rather small organisation in terms of the size of its membership, is very effective at lobbying Congress and lobbying the Executive Branch to get its way. And the same basic story applies to the Israel lobby.

MARGOT O'NEILL: Former US ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, is named as being part of the loose coalition making up the Israel lobby, but he vehemently rejects what he says is Mearsheimer and Walt's implication of a Jewish conspiracy to subvert American foreign policy.

MARTIN INDYK, FORMER US AMBASSADOR TO ISRAEL: People say, well, if they're positing this kind of conspiracy, then they're really verging on anti-Semitism because of the way in which conspiracy theories have been generated to - like, in particular to the protocols of the elders of Zion - to generate anti-Semitism.

MARGOT O'NEILL: But Martin Indyk acknowledges the power of the lobby in Congress.

MARTIN INDYK: Yes, they do have influence in Congress, and yes, congressmen, in particular, because they're up for re-election every two years, do think twice about whether they're going to cast an anti-Israel vote because they don't want to have the wrath of this powerful lobby come down on them.

MARGOT O'NEILL: Now, a new book about the Middle East conflict argues there's also a right-wing pro-Israel lobby in Australia represented by the Australia/Israel Jewish Affairs Council, or AIJAC. Sydney author Antony Loewentsein says AIJAC tries to bully its critics.

ANTHONY LoeWENSTEIN, AUTHOR MY ISRAEL QUESTION: If you're Jewish and you criticise Israel, or criticise even a policy of the Israeli Government, you're a self-hating Jew or anti-Semitic or you're unpatriotic or treasonous. I've been accused of all those and far worse. If you're non-Jewish, you're anti-Semite or anti-Israel hater.

MARGOT O'NEILL: AIJAC's Colin Rubenstein rejects the charge.

COLIN RUBENSTEIN, AIJAC: We point out to editors and the media, mistakes, inaccuracies, and, of course, we ask for alternative views to the ones that are put incessantly usually criticising Israel. So we want a genuine debate, which is what you would expect in an open society.

MARGOT O'NEILL: Australia's only current Federal Jewish MP, Labor's Michael Danby, says Melbourne University should never have published the book.

MICHAEL DANBY, LABOR MP: I think it's strange that a prestigious publisher like Melbourne University wants to poke the Australian-Jewish community in the eye and publish something by such a fringe player.

PROFESSOR MEARSHEIMER: I think it's absolutely disgraceful that people are talking about the possibility of banning this book. In fact, what most Australians should do is go out and buy the book and read it, so they can hear both sides of the debate about how Israel treats the Palestinians.

MARGOT O'NEILL: The battle for public support amid the escalating bloodshed in the Middle East seems set to intensify. Margot O'Neill, Lateline.